User blog:Cconan555/Competitive Battling Pt. 2: Electric Boogaloo
Introduction If you've read my previous guide, you already know about TPs, UPs, and personalities, and how they affect competitive battling. Maybe you've already done a ton of grinding for TP (like I have), and now have a few Loomians who are TP trained. But TP training, good personality hunting, and lucky UPs (or just using shards) alone won't guarantee victory. A team that has not done any of the above still has a decent chance of winning. Why? All those things that you grinded only give an advantage to your Loomians. If you trained your Tahtab to have 200 Melee Attack, you might guarantee that in some matchups, it will OHKO (One-hit KO) an opponent, whereas a randomly trained Tahtab wouldn't be able to secure an OHKO. Maybe if you put some Ranged Defense into a Loomian, it won't faint in one hit from Zuelong. But besides securing KOs and keeping your Loomians alive, TPs, UPs, and personalities don't really offer much else. Now, you have to think about how you're going to battle. Stats alone don't give victory. Team-building So you have all these TP trained Loomians. Great. Don't just mash them together though, and call it a team. You have to think about what you want your team to be like. Want a team that absorbs hits and just waits until the opponent loses to poison? Make a stall team! Want a team that goes all out and destroys opponents before they can even react? Make a hyper-offensive team! There's also some compositions that fall in between, of course, such as a balanced team in terms of typing and stats. A good start would be to find a core of a team. What's a core you ask? Let's say you want to use Zuelong. It's strong and hits hard, but there are some things that render it useless (such as Gastroak). So naturally, you'd want to pair Zuelong with a Loomian that can deal with Gastroak easily (such as Searknight). Congratulations. You have your core (Zuelong and Searknight). Now all you have to do is build around the weaknesses that your core has. For example, Earth types like Sedimars and Boarrok will counter Searknight, so what Loomian can you put on your team to deal with those Loomians? Luminami works wonderfully in that situation. But then, Loomians like Zuelong can threaten Luminami, so... You get the idea. Play around your team's weaknesses. Based on what kind of Loomians you put on your team, you can create stall teams, hyper-offensive teams, etc. Battling There are multiple parts to actually fighting battles, and you should get a good idea of each to fight better. Checks and Counters Checks are Loomians that can stop a threat, but not reliably counter it. For example, Sedimars can switch into Zuelong and threaten it, forcing it to switch out, but it won't be able to take repeated attacks from Zuelong (Elemental burst usually 2HKOs or 3HKOs Sedimars, unless Sedimars has a ton of TP in Ranged Defense). A counter is a Loomian that always puts a stop to an enemy Loomian throughout the entire match unless it is brought down to low HP to the point where any attack will KO it. For example, Revenine reliably counters Tahtab because it takes no damage from Junglejutsu, and Nature's Force can only 3HKO it at best (while Spectral Burst is an OHKO or 2HKO). While counters generally are better than checks at stopping a threat, that doesn't make checks automatically invalid. It just means you have to play around with their weaknesses more. Switch-ins and Predictions I know many people who complain about opponents constantly switching-out Loomians. "It makes the battle go on forever" they claim. It's true that the more you switch out, the longer the battle lasts. But when you want to win, switch-ins become a part of your straetgy. Are you really going to keep your Eruptidon on the field when the opponent has a Luminami out? No, you're going to switch out into Gastroak or Zuelong to deal with that threat. And of course, your opponent will also most likely switch out as well. The only exception to this is your Loomian has a move that can deal with it's weakness (e.g. Ikazune has Electroburst, which lets it deal significant damage to Luminami, who would otherwise shut it down since Ikazune has a x4 weakness to water ) Switch-ins also can help build momentum, especially by taking out an important target. For example, lets say your Luminami was taken down by an Gastroak. You can switch in Ursoul, who can use Chase Down to secure a KO on the Gastroak, who is most likely going to try and switch out. If you have Zuelong, one of its biggest counters has just been taken out, and you can switch into it and go nuts. So how do you deal with switch-ins besides switching out your own Loomians? Predicting opponent plays. Lets say you're using Zuelong (Zuelong is such a great example), and you're fighting a Ventacean. At first glance, you would use Thunderstrike to OHKO it, right? But what happens if they have an Earth-type like Boarrok, and they switch into Boarrok? You just wasted your energy dealing no damage to the enemy, and now you most likely have to switch out. What if you instead chose to use Elemental Burst? If you predict the switch, you can deal significant damage to Boarrok, and possibly 2HKO it with Elemental Burst. You just removed one of Zuelong's checks with Zuelong. Of course, your opponent can think of this as well. Maybe they'll switch into Falkyrie, who tanks the Elemental burst and prepares to use Gamma Pulse. You have to weigh your options. What do you think your opponent is going to switch into? Which move would be the correct choice here? Some moves are more safe options that let you damage opponents regardless (e.g. Elemental Burst) while other moves are more risky but payoff if you predict right (e.g. Spectral Burst; it can OHKO some Brawler and Spirit Types, but does nothing against Light ). Double Battles Double battles are a bit different than your standard single battle. For one, some moves like Earthquake or Storm Summon now hit your partner Loomian as well, meaning that you can't be too quick about using those moves, lest you risk knocking out your own partner. However, a partner Loomian can also be a benefit, as it can deal with some Loomians that would otherwise force your Loomian to switch out in a single battle situation. And some Loomians aren't the best in single battles, but become very good in double battles (Volkaloa's can make full use Savage Greed and become a huge threat). Switch-ins, predictions, and checks are still the same, but now you have to take into account duo dynamics and how well your team would do against the enemy's duo. You might want to think about which duos work well together. Miscellaneous Tidbits *'Don't swim against the current'. What I mean by that is, if you attack an enemy Loomian and it just shrugs off your damage like nothing, consider switching out (unless they do even less damage to you). It doesn't matter if you deal super-effective damage, it doesn't benefit you to fight something that doesn't care about your damage. Find something that can deal more damage, though I wouldn't reccomend some risky maneuvers like switching Eruptidon into Himbrr. *'Status Conditions are worse than they seem'. You might take a small bit of damage from a burn and say, "Wow, this burn does nothing". But burns do more than just deal damage. It reduces Melee Attacks, which can shut down some Loomians. Paralysis slows down your Loomians, and it can completely stop them from using a move when it is most crucial. Getting Badly Poisoned means that unless you switch out, your Loomian will take more and more damage, up to the point where it will eventually be KOd by the poison even if you heal. Sleep and Dazed work similarly to Paralysis where it just prevents your Loomian from moving. *'Be careful of entry hazards'. Same deal with status conditions. Icicle trap might not do a ton of damage, but it may guarantee some opposing Loomians the ability to OHKO your Loomian. If possible, try to get some Loomians who can hazard clear (Cynamoth , Avitross , and Eruptidon have moves that get rid of hazards) *'RNG exists'. Sometimes you get a lucky critical hit. Sometimes you miss your Poison on the enemy. This game still has a lot of RNG in it, and it can either help you out or screw you over. You can't control it, so you'll need to adapt. Conclusion So, there you have it. A basic idea of how to fight better in PvP. This still doesn't guarantee that you'll win all the time, but at least it helps you fight people better than simply going gung-ho and pressing the attack button. In any case, I hope you learned a little something from this. Category:Blog posts